As the net tightens around the Guptas, who may finally face the music during the State Capture parliamentary enquiry in March, the man at the centre of the business empire is playing dumb.

Absolutely moronic might be more accurate, but we will get to that later.

The Gupta family have now briefed Houghton-based law firm, Gani Mayet attorneys, to prepare their defence. They must be paying some serious dosh to the firm, because the PR backlash to representing the Guptas will be pretty intense.

Lawyer Ahmed Gani confirmed that he is acting for the Gupta family, adding that he had approached the family offering to represent them.

Huff Post SA have managed to get their hands on notes from the discussions between the family and the firm, and here’s the outline of their defence:

deny that they have been enriched;

deny a close relationship with former Eskom CEO Brian Molefe;

deny the veracity of the #Guptaleaks emails.

They currently face charges related to the farce on the Vrede dairy farm project in the Free State , and the Asset Forfeiture Unit (AFU) are closing in as well.

And now for the main course, which involves Ajay Gupta’s explanation of why he has done bugger all wrong:

While investigative journalists have mapped a massive corporate empire of interlocking interests, Ajay Gupta told his lawyers that he has virtually no assets.

“No, on record I can say that I am not a shareholder of any company, I don’t have any assets in any part of the world, except the room my father used to sleep [in], personally that’s all [I have].

“I don’t have any share, any board [position], any property, any fixed property, whatever you call that. Maybe one car or something, I only have that one room my father used to sleep [in].”

…The family’s patriarch also tried to put distance between himself and [former Eskom CEO Brian] Molefe. In another note, he says: “Maybe one time, I bump into him at the airport or something… and I remember just ‘hello, hello’ nothing [else]. Just one word.”

Not only does he want us to believe that he is basically a pauper who has had virtually zero interaction with Molefe, but he wants us to believe that the emails are fake because he is technologically inept:

Ajay Gupta sounds like he will deny the veracity of the leaked emails. “Whether it’s [the emails] doctored or not, I still have no issue. I’m very much sure, 100% sure that we did not do anything wrong…” Ajay Gupta told his lawyers.

“…one more interesting thing, you please note it down. I never did email in my life. I am illiterate. I don’t know how to do the SMS, even, forget about, even WhatsApps or anything. My secretary receives the email and she opens it, she prints it and brings it to me if it comes to that”…

That’s Ajay, the brains behind the Gupta empire, trying to make us believe that his secretary prints out emails and hand delivers them to him.

Buddy, you’re not Trump, we don’t buy that you’re such an idiot.

Wouldn’t it be great if the Gupta brothers cracked under pressure and started ratting each other out?

My money is on Atul to start singing first – there’s just something about him.